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A Detailed Cross-Examination of Yesterday and Today's Best-Selling Platform Games

The First Ten Minutes

A common
belief amongst psychologists is that people make up a vast majority of
their total opinion of a person in the first five seconds of meeting.
It would also be fair to say that games are also subject to this
nature-programmed degree of scrutiny.

We’ll stretch
this test time slightly from five seconds to ten minutes and examine
factors that are relevant to a player's enticement and enjoyment within
the first ten minutes of gameplay.

Bear in mind
that games reviewers are particularly sensitive to negativity in a
game’s initial moments, and when games nowadays are mostly reviewed for
an average of a handful of hours before the verdict goes to print,
you’ll be able to appreciate why the functionality and enjoyment of a
game’s beginnings is worthy of your focused attention.

1. Visuals

Just
as the 16-bit era was drawing to a close – thanks largely to Sony’s
Playstation - a flood of titles appeared which promised ‘best ever
graphics’ as their main unique selling point. This was largely because
the title was made entirely using FMV technology. Such titles included
Night Trap on Mega CD, Voyeur on Phillips CDi and Sewer Shark on 3DO.

This
flood was met with initial awe and helped titles that relied on better
graphics to sell rather well, but of course these fads eventually died
out and as a result, the market was made aware that appealing visuals
are not worth hinging a while game on for an engaging game experience,
if the mechanics and play rules are at least not up to standard.

One
thing developers learnt from this short-lived gold rush, is that
enticing visuals are important, and the old adage of “graphics doesn’t
matter”, was and is largely an idealistic and unrealistic view in
regards to having your titles sell well.

In turn,
marketers learnt that mechanics play a significant role and a game is
more likely to sell if both graphics and mechanical design are well
executed.

See the terminology on the following page, to understand terms that will be used throughout this analysis.

Terminology

Touch Hurt Hazards: Hazards that take a hit-point from the player character when the hazard is touched.

PC: Player character – meaning the character whom the player controls.

Kill Zone: A bottomless pit or an area that upon entering will kill you instantly.

Boost: An object, which increases the level of whatever it’s boosting – speed or strength for instance.

Quota Token: A token or item which is part of a set. Once the set is complete, a reward is received. Types include:

Area unlock: To gain access to an area when quota is met

Ability unlock: To gain access to a new ability when set quota is met

Event unlock: To have an event cue upon meeting a specified quota

Bonus area unlock: To open a Bonus area upon meeting a set quota

New level unlock: To open a new game level upon meeting a set quota

Character unlock: To unlock use of a new character upon sufficient quota

Bonus game unlock: To unlock additional bonus games

Sub-Quota token: A token or item which is part of a sub-set. Once this set is complete, a reward in the form of a Quota Token is received.

A Beat:
A word describing an on-rails navigational route that an enemy or
platform takes – when you see an enemy walking back and forth on a
platform for instance.